


On the Shore's Edge

by Alliance (Xazz)



Series: Cypress Hall [20]
Category: Flight Rising
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-19
Updated: 2018-06-19
Packaged: 2019-05-25 06:58:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 689
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14971574
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Xazz/pseuds/Alliance





	On the Shore's Edge

The water of the swamp was always murky, the depths impenetrable except around the magnificent spring in the center of the Hall. Even below the surface visibility was limited and everyone knew that it wasn’t a good idea to swim in the swamp in humi form. It was something hatchlings learned quickly if they intended to stay in the Hall.

A trio of rich blue and spotted down hatchlings stood on a thick branch over the swamp water. Two coatls and a wildclaw with deep blue eyes bickering and arguing over something. Then they came to a conclusion and in unison, the coatls pushed their brother off the branch and into the water.

The hatchling sputtered and clawed for the surface. He didn’t fear drowning since he’d been born a Water dragon but the water still tasted like rotting vegetation. “Not funny! I’m telling mom!” he yelled up at his sisters.

“I’m telling mom,” they mocked him in their gigglish voices.

He looked down when something brushed his leg. Of course, the water was too murky to see. “Mmmm,” he whined and started paddling towards the shore. The something brushed his side again and then he yelled when something large poked at his belly and he felt teeth against his soft stomach.

“Oh stop being so dramatic,” one of his sisters jeered.

“I’m not!” he yelled even as he was picked up out of the water on the head of some horrible monster. It had three great sails on its head and emerged from the muck like an old statue. His sister shrieked in horror and scrambled out of the tree, gliding down to the ground and half running half hopping into the air back towards their mother’s hut.

Under him the monster chuckled and with a yelp he felt himself taken by one of their claws. He curled up a bit while they held him by under his front two limbs and he stared at them with terrified blue eyes. They were half rotting and he could see their skull. “Are you alright? You took quite a spill,” they asked him in a deep but gentle voice.

“Ah-uh… I-uh…” he could only stare.

“Hmmm,” they casually waded to the shore and gently put him down. “It’s dangerous to swim in the island straits. The currents could sweep you away,” she said.

“I–I-

“[Lurk](http://flightrising.com/main.php?p=lair&id=332919&tab=dragon&did=36416168),” he looked behind him to see that his sisters had brought [Aya](http://flightrising.com/main.php?p=lair&id=332919&tab=dragon&did=36805279) to him, “What is going on? My daughters said you were going to eat my son.”

The monster chuckled and sank into the swamp water so only their head was visible. “I was to do no such thing. They pushed him off the branch and if he’s anything like Gemini he can’t swim at all. I was merely assisting.”

Aya came over to him and picked his wet, sodden, form up and put him to her breast, getting her shirt all soaked with swamp water. He twisted around to keep his eye on the monster his mother wasn’t afraid of. “That wasn’t the story I was told,” she said gravely.

“You know how hatchlings are. They get scared of their own shadows,” Lurk said mischievously.

“Yes,” Aya said. Then she looked behind her at his two scared sisters who were hiding in the grass watching with huge terrified eyes, their crests pressed down low to their necks. “I will have to have a word about what lives in the waters of the Hall then, shall’t I?” she asked Lurk casually. Lurk positively giggled.

“Keep a better eye on your children, Aya. Not all of them are as nice as me.” Aya just ‘hmphed’ unamused. Lurk vanished below the water.

“Mama, what was that?”

“A swamp thing. You should be lucky she’s so nice,” Aya said and walked back over to his sisters. “As for _you two_. We’re going to have a long talk about being nice to your brother!” and she grabbed one with her hand and the other with her tail by the joint of the wing and with a bit of a painful tug pulled them back towards the cottage.


End file.
